But as I've gotten older, I've seen friends suffer through various things. Friends that went through breast cancer treatment and then the chemo stimulated a neurological cascade and, this is a a friend of mine who recently passed away, but she ended up having, the worst form of Parkinson's, and then another best friend here who lost her husband in his early 60s from a condition. So I'm happy to announce I'm 63, so you know where I'm coming from. Then in particular this past year, so 2023, was really dedicated to taking care of my mother who almost made it to 90, but she had a form of COPD and just taking care of her, in my case traveling to California every five to six weeks checking in. What I learned, Richard, was that my two sisters lived closer to her, I'm the one that lives in another state, but I was able to sort of see the change that my mom was going through and to see her needs as they changed. It's the person who's there, you know, three days at a time, 24 hours a day, that's the person who can say, wow, mom's not able to make her meals anymore, or mom's losing her appetite at dinner but is somehow managing to make herself a cocktail. You know what I mean? That was startling to me. So I would go there, I would stay with her, and that was the way I could contribute as somebody that did not live close by. But by being with her and realizing, that food is more than food, if that makes sense. Can somebody make it? What do they have an appetite for? And also realizing the importance of companionship and company around that meal. It was so, so obvious that my mom would be more likely to sit and eat a meal if I was eating with her. At that point, she was in a community, like a senior apartment community, and she had a wonderful relationship with her little next door neighbor, and we would have him over all the time and invite him over and I would make various foods. But anyway, that just cemented sort of how important this topic is to me.
Richard Wexler No, I can totally understand that obviously all that you've done, your educational background, and then having to deal with this personally with your own mom in 2023, I totally understand that. That kind of takes me to my next question: From a nutrition and health perspective what changes as we age? Elaine Magee Yeah, quite a few things, Richard. As you probably know, physiologically we are less efficient at synthesizing protein. That's one of the reasons, there's many, the protein that we eat in our food is even more important, in a way, as we age. Also blood pressure tends to increase as we age, so for somebody who that might not have been an issue with in the past, that can change. It's important to know if what we eat is nutrient dense. Does it have a lot of nutrients? That's what they mean by nutrient dense. Because even more important, because as we age, we tend to eat less, right? Our metabolic rate goes down. That's another reason why it's good to have muscle mass that helps increase that metabolic rate. Our skin produces less Vitamin D from sunlight as we age, so somebody that might not have been supplementing with vitamin D, may need to look into that as they age. You know, those are just a few examples. Also, inflammation plays a key role in many diseases associated with age. So overall just looking at the inflammation in our bodies, and are we eating an anti-inflammatory type of diet, is there some underlying cause that might be contributing to inflammation, all of that right becomes more important. And lastly, our brain ages too. So it's more and more important that the foods we eat help protect the brain. Everything does pretty much fit together when I'll talk later about the sort of what are my steps to healthy aging. It's not like oh, I'm going to do this for the brain and this for the you know inflammation... it all kind of fits together that's the good news. Richard Wexler This is fascinating. And for my listening audience, I mean and I hate this word, "assume", but I'm assuming myself and a lot of people, I mean, as you age, like at any time you're sticking food in your mouth, and I don't know if people are really thinking about the effects of what they eat or what they don't eat. In the last couple minutes, I mean, every time I do this podcast I learn so much from my guests, that was a lot of incredible information. What's your advice for healthy aging for folks? Elaine Magee I'm going to put it in a handful of steps for you and the first one is sort of eat and exercise for the health of it and to boost your muscle mass. So strangely, right? I mean, I feel like when you're young, maybe you're into building muscle because you're more of an athlete. or you're more active, or you're in college, or whatever it is, but as we age, that's pivotal. I'll talk a little bit more about why, but that's that's key. So aiming for at least 20 grams of protein at each meal is a pretty good rule of thumb. Another tip is filling half your plate with colorful vegetables and fruits. People ask me all the time, are there certain foods or plants that we should try to get every day because they're super foods? There's a couple I would say try to get a dark leafy green every single day. There are things that make that easier, those are bagged (I shop at Albertsons) so that bag, you know of spinach, greens or kale, that's washed and ready to go - that's so convenient. Throwing that in every time you have soup, stew, every time you make eggs. Throw in some dark leafy greens in the casseroles. If it's handy like just hey, have I got my dark leafy greens today? So that's important. The other superfood probably on the fruit end is berries, and that is berries in the brain. Just remember that berries help the brain too, and the heart they're just beaming with nutrients that we need polyphenols, all kinds of plant compounds. So I personally try to get berries every day. Dark leafy greens every day. But the overall tip is to fill half your plate with colorful fruits and vegetables. OK, now the next tip is to switch to whole grains every chance you get. So you know if you're baking, really looking at "hey can I replace at least half of this with whole wheat flour? Can I, for this particular casserole, can I use quinoa? Can I use brown rice instead of white rice?" That sort of thing. Whole grain pastas or chickpea pastas, a lot of gluten free legume pastas are amazing. Your breads, your tortillas, whatever it is that that's important to you, ask "Can I make a better choice with whole grains?" That's going to have a lot of fiber and all these other plant compounds that come along with that fiber and that whole grain. So that's you know, that's the next step and then enjoying fish and beans and legumes several times a week. You know, I know some people might not care for either of those, or tolerate either of those, but if you do really try to get fish a couple times a week, it could be albacore tuna packed in water or in a pouch right on a Friday, you know, for lunch. It could be a really nice easy pan fried salmon. For example, at Alberston's right near the seafood counter, you can get smoked salmon, but not lox, right? The salmon that still looks like salmon and it's smoked and cooked and ready to go- that's how convenient it is. You pick that up and you add it to a salad, add it to your eggs, you know, add it to make a salmon toast with avocado, like, that's super easy and you don't even have to cook it, so just looking for opportunities to add seafood and beans and legumes a few times a week. I'm admitting right now to your audience that getting a few servings of beans and legumes is a really hard for me. I don't know why. It's just somehow not as easy for me. Canned beans, frozen edamame- all those make it easier, but I am better at the seafood, believe it or not. Ohh and back on the grains, I just posted maybe a week ago on my Instagram a pumpkin pancake that I developed that has no sugar added and is 100% whole wheat and you'd never miss anything, it's delicious. So it is possible now. Also one more tip in nuts and seeds. Embracing nuts and seeds and low fat dairy products, daily, if tolerated. You know for the dairy, that's where you're going to get quality protein. You're going to get some Vitamin D, Calcium... Some of the things we need as we age. If it's not tolerated, well you can do the lactose-free types of milk. I don't necessarily drink milk as a beverage, but I use ultra filtered milk that has higher amounts of protein and less carbohydrate. I'll make overnight chia pudding with that, and I use it to make lattes (with my strong coffee at home). I use it in other ways, not necessarily for drinking. And the nuts and seeds, just huge. People ask me all the time, "Is any one better than the other?" and I just think they all bring different things. Right? Walnuts have the highest amount of plant omega-3, but Brazil nuts are shockingly high in selenium, which is a antioxidant mineral, and almonds have plant steriles, so they all have their high points. In general, whatever nuts and seeds you like- I get Chia seeds or ground flaxseed almost every day. They're kind of their cousins, so I'll get one or the other almost every day in different ways. So anyway, and then I guess my last step is to stay as active as you can, for as long as you can. That's one of my mottos. And movement, you'll see later maybe as we get more into some research about the people who have made it to 100 around the world, staying physically active, and it doesn't have to mean you know, take an aerobics class or anything, it just means you're moving a lot. You're moving in your day, whether it's gardening, walking with a friend in the neighborhood, playing tennis at the club, whatever it is. However, that means to you just really trying to stay physically active as much as you can as you age, and that is, I think the elixir. For me, at 63, I started doing Pilates Reformer halfway through COVID and I my body, you can tell what your body likes, right? My body loves it, and I feel like it's my version of muscle resistance training, because you're using your body, your appendages, as resistance plus the springs on the reformer. So I do that three times a week, that's like my my weight lifting, right, I'm just not somebody who's going to go to a gym and lift a bunch of weights, but I can do Pilates class. So I think it's also important to exercise your muscle- it's kind of like use it or lose it on so many levels as you age. Use your brain, challenge your brain, use your body, challenge your body. Like all of that, the more we can keep our bones and our muscle and our brain vibrant as we age, definitely the better off we're going to be. Richard Wexler This is folks, this is unbelievable information. I would really encourage you a listen to what Elaine's talking about, B, tell your folks about this episode on the podcast, friends, enemies, loved ones, relatives- everybody, co-workers- this is fantastic information, please pass it along. Elaine, you've mentioned this word protein many, many times. Why is it so important as we age? Elaine Magee Well, everything you know, I've already said, but what I want to add to that here's what research is telling us: in older adults, higher protein diets are associated with greater lean body mass, which is, you know, so helpful keeping your metabolic rate high. It's associated with better grip strength, better lower body strength, better physical function, and just better activities of daily life. It just becomes crucial and keeps us stronger, less likely to fall, which as you know, I'm sure in your audience falling becomes such a risk for various reasons. And then just keeping that darn metabolic rate higher as we age so we're able to eat more food so that we have more opportunity to get the nutrients we need. Otherwise you're, you know, you're it's just kind of like a downward spiral, I think at some point. Becoming less active, with less muscle strength, and you just end up being more sedentary because you don't feel as strong the less active you are. It just puts you into a whole different bucket, if that makes sense. Richard Wexler Sure. How can people, you mentioned kind of a protein target, so much protein per meal, how can people meet that amount when they eat? Elaine Magee Yeah. So the way to approach protein, what a lot of people do is they don't have a lot of protein at breakfast and lunch, but then they try to eat all their protein at dinner with a steak or something. But really the best strategy is to spread it out throughout the day. Our body is much more likely to utilize, digest, absorb and utilize the protein that we get if it's spread out throughout the day. That's not just for people as they age. I worked with athletes at Stanford, you mentioned it in my bio. For young athletes, it's the same thing. I'm still going to say the same thing for them. Basically a workable target for a lot of people is 60 grams of protein a day, so that might be trying to get 20 grams at breakfast at minimum. Right, 20 grams breakfast, lunch and dinner. Breakfast, I'm going to tell you is probably the the most difficult meal to hit 20 grams because you think eggs, right. Eggs are amazing and I pay that extra whatever it is to get pasture raised eggs. You're going to have orange yolks in those pasture raised eggs and they're going to have higher levels of everything you want in eggs and lower levels of what you don't want in eggs. But there's way more things that you want in eggs, they are amazing. But anyway, each one has about 6 grams of protein, so even if you do a two way omelette or something, that's still 12 grams, you're still not at 20. So it does get a bit harder for breakfast, but it can be done. You know, eggs are amazing. I look for cheese, a nice cheese to be added to things. I use that ultra filtered milk to make a latte, and boy, that packs a wallop. Greek yogurt, ohh my goodness, a nice plain Greek yogurt, I just use that all the time, to me it's sour cream, it's the base for a healthier mayonnaise. (I'll make that with some extra virgin olive oil and some herbs and spices.) Anyway, I and I use it for my overnight chia puddings, I make yogurt parfaits also. So anyway, those are just easy and just adding nuts and nut butters to, if you're an oatmeal person, you know, make it with the ultra filtered milk instead of water and that will add calcium, vitamin D, protein... and stir in natural style peanut butter, boom, you've got some more protein there. So it's just looking for all those little opportunities to get it throughout the day. Another tip I would say on protein is getting a variety of protein so you're not just going to chicken or, you know, eggs, but really looking at all the different ways you can get your protein. In particular, I really try to enjoy an omega-3. You've probably heard of anti-inflammatory Omega threes we get them from fish. Yes, salmon. I have salmon once a week probably, I just love me some salmon. But we also we also get it from and you don't you want, you want to get your Omega threes there, yes, but you also want to get a boost of of fiber from protein sources like beans, right? That was the other thing that we said several times a week. Now, beans are interesting because they give you plant protein, right? They are off the, you know, off the charts in terms of the plant world. But they they also give you fiber and you need fiber as you age- a lot of good things come from fiber. There's many types of fibers so that's why you want your fiber from lots of different plant foods so you get all the different types of fiber and all the things that come with it. Hopefully that that helps. A little bit on the protein front. There's a research study that came out recently, and in this large research group of female nurses, they found that protein, especially plant protein, that in mid life, so for your listeners in midlife, this was associated with higher odds of healthy age. That just kind of sums it up right. I mean that just puts it there to me. Richard Wexler And while I'm just going to say, I mean, I'm listening to all this and folks, I mean an amazing amount of information and I'm going to encourage you again, pass this episode on Mom, Dad, grandparents, in-laws, friends- this is great information. I always tell people it's great to be older today than it was yesterday, that means we're still here and obviously we need to be eating properly and the information that Elaine is giving us is just fantastic. A couple of minutes ago you you were talking about people that are hitting 100 more and more people in that category, what are we learning from these folks? Elaine Magee Yeah, it's been fascinating. I mean, it was called blue zones some years ago, but there's some local dietitians here in Idaho that have been doing their own research, meeting with and hanging out with some of these centenarians, people who had hit the 100 mark, and just basically, I mean, how fascinating is that- looking for the common denominators in this special group of people around the world. They're hitting the Mediterranean, people in Japan, even you know here. So it's just interesting. And here's some of the common denominators, or as I like to say "the keys to longevity." Basically number one, they were eating genuine foods, whole foods, fresh, local, organic. Organic in particular, there seems to be less pesticides and things like that, but it does seem to have a higher antioxidant capacity in research, so just something to keep in mind. And what that means when you're eating more of these whole genuine foods, you're eating less of that processed food, right? The there's a new term being used called ultra-processed and basically what I tell people is that is it something that was created in a lab? Right. 100 years ago, did they have Ritz Bits? You know what I mean? Not to call out Ritz Bits, but things like that- was it created in a lab or was it created in a farm? You know what I mean? So just kind of keeping that in mind and it's not that you can't have ultra-processed food ever again, it just means as you age, put more attention to the more genuine foods. These people cooked and ate meals at home. Wow, what a concept. You know, because when you're cooking at home, you're more likely to be having those genuine foods and you're controlling the type of fat that you're cooking with, the types of vegetables you're adding to it. But also, meals are more social. They're finding pleasure in these foods and in these meals, there's a connectedness to their community or their family that comes with those meals eaten at home. They're having vegetables at every meal. A lot of them have their own gardens, nurture their own gardens, and they're really trying to have vegetables every single meal. And I would even say snack on vegetables have some veggies ready to go- maybe carrots, zucchini, cucumber, broccoli, cauliflower, and little florets, and you know, having some nice hummus or whatever it is, or a yogurt based dip to just enjoy them as a snack. Another thing, they also had fermented foods and there does seem to be some anti-aging effects in scientific studies of fermented foods. In case your audience needs to just kind of be reminded of what is a fermented food, when I read this list, just remember the ones that you like that are meaningful to you, because for me, the first one doesn't resonate, it's sauerkraut. I'm just not a sauerkraut person. Can't do it. Don't want to do it. So I'm gonna find the other ones on the list. Right. OK. Tofu, sour dough, cheese, pickles, chutney, Kiefer, red wine (I bet some people like that one), yogurt, kimchi, kombucha, miso, soy sauce, sour cream (although I use yogurt instead of sour cream), Tabasco sauce, tempeh, Worcestershire sauce...those are just some of them. Some of those things that you can do every day in order to get your fermented foods if you can. Also, plant based eating, you know a lot of plant, or plant focused, or plant powered, eating doesn't have to mean plants only. It just means you know you're really filling half of your plate or part of a large portion of your plate with plants. They had physical movement and they definitely stayed physically active, walking around town, walking to get their groceries in town, you know, tending their garden, that sort of thing. And they had a socialization. They were very social within their communities and their families and they had a certain amount of gratitude in their life. They lived life, sort of in a in a mindful grateful state. So that, I mean, boy, we should all aim for that, right. Richard Wexler I would agree, I agree. I mean folks, this is unbelievable and fantastic information. As we get close to wrapping up Elaine, how is your perspective on food and diet as we age? How is that changed if it has? Elaine Magee Well, it definitely has. I just think my own journey has taught me so much like this, the last year tending to my mom, and sort of seeing somebody at the end of their life- and how quickly, Richard, how quickly things can change for somebody. All you need for some people is just one fall to just kind of, precipitate a cascade of challenges, right? But beyond that, just me personally, I'm also way more aware now that our body can change, it can develop food sensitivities or allergies that you never had. Also, conditions that you didn't even you know you could have. I think for me it's important to understand the underlying causes of things get to the bottom of it. I think just our healthcare system in general has become, you know, a Band-Aid, right. Where you're just, is there a pill I can take for this, instead of saying why, you know, why has this changed? Why is my blood pressure increasing? Why are my inflammatory markers higher? You know, all of a sudden, like, what's going on? And I think also lastly, I've always had respect for the microbiome, but now more than ever, research is backing me up here where, and by microbiome, I mean sort of the balance of bacteria that's in your intestinal tract, and we know that so much of our immunity comes from that- but having a balance of good and bad, you know, we know we're gonna have bad bacteria, but having enough good bacteria in there really does impact inflammation and how food is absorbed. I'm more and more inclined to look to the microbiome for answers. Richard Wexler Amazing information, folks. You're going to be really startled with what I'm what I'm about to say. We're about 35-36 minutes into this episode. I have not mentioned as of yet, but I'm about to use my four letter dirty word called P-L-A-N. I mean, think about everything we've been, Elaine's been, talking about, it is planning. It is being proactive. It is understanding both the exercise and the diet, what you're eating, what you shouldn't be eating, how you're eating protein, etcetera. This is wonderful information. I mean, here again, bad word "assuming", I'm assuming most people want to stay pretty healthy as we age, it isn't fun to not be healthy from an illness, from a fall, both. So that planning that being proactive, that understanding what we're putting into our mouth and our body is so important. Elaine, if people want to reach out to you, what do you want to give out? Phone number, e-mail, any website, social media, etcetera. Elaine Magee Probably the best way to keep track of me is through my social media. So for anybody on Instagram, it's @therecipedoctor, and I post daily. Seriously, so I put a lot of effort into my Instagram. Please follow me. Please tell your friends the more the merrier in that regard. And if you're on Facebook, cause I I get it, I get that people are on Instagram and maybe they're on Facebook. Everything I post on the recipe doctor on Instagram goes to a Facebook page with the same name, so you can follow me and track me down on Facebook with the the name, therecipedoctor. Richard Wexler Fantastic folks. Again as we get ready to wrap up, if you want to get in touch with me, you have a comment, you have questions, you'd like to be a guest on the podcast, that e-mail again, [email protected]. I really want to thank. Elaine, I wanna thank all you folks for listening and until we talk again, have yourself an awesome day.
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